Surviving The Unthinkable

"It [her captivity] reminded me of the Holocaust. I thought I was going crazy."

"I was really afraid, and without barely any light or food I felt that I was going crazy."

"I said if Anne Frank could write, why couldn't I."

"I said to myself, 'Where are our planes? When I heard them [overhead], I was very happy, and was not afraid."

"After being held alone for so long, I was back with my family."

Ofelia Roitman, 77, former Hamas hostage

Ofelia Roitman, 77, was taken captive from her Kibbutz Nir Oz home on October 7, 2023, after Hamas terrorists attacked the community. She was freed on November 28, 2023. (Courtesy)

The grandmother of nine was recounting her experience as an Israeli hostage taken into captivity by Hamas terrorists in their orgy of slaughter, rape, mass murder and abduction on October 7. Her home was in Kibbutz Nir Oz, and on that morning the former educator had taken shelter in her safe room following siren warnings of incoming rockets from the Gaza Strip. She was alone in her home, her husband was recuperating in hospital from a recent surgery.

She called her daughter Natalie Madmon at 9:37 that morning with the message: "They are here, please, please!" The safe room's steel door was sprayed with bullets, one of which hit her arm. She was now a prisoner, as an elderly civilian Israeli, of terrorists. One of the attackers thoughtfully used a shoelace as a tourniquet to wrap her arm. And then she was thrown face down in a tractor for the drive back to Gaza with her captors. 

 

When Israeli soldiers arrived there were no signs of a struggle, and days later notification was forwarded to her family that she was a hostage in Gaza.

When Ofelia Roitman arrived in Gaza with her captors she was taken to a tunnel, and there a female Palestinian medic refused to tend to her wound. In English, she said "I don't treat Jews". She was overruled by the man who had taken charge of Roitman, insisting she be given basic medical attention, and then placed in a wheelchair, she was wheeled through the streets for a 20 minute trip to an apartment. There she would be held for the following 46 days.

From there her injuries were treated by a doctor periodically who was dressed in full burqa covering with an eye slit. She was warned not to say a word to anyone. When her captors wanted her family phone numbers she responded they were in her cellphone back at her house. For the following month and a half she was unaware whether it was night or day. Both light and food withheld, but for the very basic, to keep her alive.

Her days seemed endless, and gnawing hunger beset her, as she paced around in circles. Given a pita with za'atar daily, she would tear it into pieces and eat it through the day. She was given dry rice at night. "The food issue for me was like in the Holocaust", she said, on her eventual release. Noticing a pen and notebook she asked for permission to write in it, and after that, the next 53 days had her keeping a diary where, as an Argentinian-born, she wrote in Spanish.

Under the building where she was kept captive, tunnels stretched beneath, from where Hamas fighters would fire rockets at Israel and when a projectile was fired, the building shook. She heard crowds outside the building erupt into celebratory calls any time a missile reached Tel Aviv or Beersheva. On day 47 of her captivity, Ofelia Roitman was taken to a hospital, and there was reunited with two of her kibbutz neighbours.

The following day the three neighbours were delivered to the care of the Red Cross, and from there,  they were returned to Israel. Her nephew in Buenos Aeries, a popular sports broadcaster, began each game's broadcast during her captivity with a public reminder of his aunt's abduction along with other Israeli captives. In Argentina she became known as "Aunt Ofelia". 

Her kibbutz and home destroyed, she lives now in  an Israeli retirement centre, with her husband.

Palestinian terrorists transport a captured Israeli civilian, Adina Moshe, from her home in Kibbutz Nir Oz to be held as a hostage in the Gaza Strip on October 7, 2023. (AP Photo)